by Dana Corbit
But as he climbed off his bike, he had the sinking feeling that something was off. Until then he hadn’t noticed several cars already parked in the lot, but now they were there as signs that he’d dropped the ball. Saturday, of course. That was what his mother was trying to tell him. Though the shop closed early on Saturday afternoons, the kitchen also opened early when they had wedding cake orders.
Breaking into a jog, he crossed the parking lot to the other side of the building. The door was propped open, and a chorus of voices filtered from inside. Great. As if the staff didn’t already think he was the boss’s incompetent son, he’d just proven them right.
He trudged down the hall, barely stopping to prop his helmet on the shelf, hang his jacket and change from his riding boots to work shoes, before hurrying into the kitchen. The room was hopping, with decorators and bakers already hard at work. Even two part-timers were working along one of the empty counters, making nothing but rosettes and hundreds of tiny green leaves.
“Hey, you’re early,” Caroline, who was coming in from the dining area, called out when she saw him.
Logan pressed his lips together. She’d probably had a heyday, sharing jokes with all of the staff. “Sorry—”
Caroline kept talking as if he hadn’t spoken. “I was just telling the staff that you had business this morning, so you’d asked me to open for you.” If she noticed his surprise, she didn’t let on. “Did you finish everything you needed to do?”
Logan couldn’t help but stare. It was like before. She was covering for him again, but this time she was doing it without letting the others in on it. Good thing they’d already agreed to call it equal because he would have owed her big-time for this one.
“Well, did you?” she pressed.
He cleared his throat. “Yeah. All done.”
“Well, good because I wanted to ask you who we should call about the sink.”
“The sink?”
He glanced over at the stainless-steel sink along the wall. The water that filled one side nearly to the top had globs of pink buttercream floating in it.
“Just a guess, but I’m pretty sure it’s clogged.”
“Oh, really?” he said.
Caroline grinned before turning serious again. “Do you know which plumber your mother usually works with?”
“None, if she can help it.”
“We’ve got to do something. And soon,” Margie said in the tight tone of an artist under stress. “We have to have one of these cakes delivered to the community center and the other one to Lakeside Country Club by twelve-thirty.”
Caroline waved away the decorator’s concern with a brush of her hand. “Don’t worry. We’ll be fine. We’ve got this under control.” She turned back to Logan. “At least I hope Logan does.”
Though the frenzy of activity continued around them, staff members took turns sending curious glances at their temporary bosses.
Caroline gestured toward the sink and then turned back to Logan. Her wide-eyed expression of an ingenue made him fight back a grin. He would have to razz her later for pouring her act on so thick. The woman who never needed anything from anyone was offering him the chance to come to the rescue in front of the whole staff.
“I’ll take a look first, and then I’ll call in a professional if it’s going to be too big a job.”
“Sounds like a good plan to me,” she said.
He still half expected Caroline to stand around, watching him and second-guessing his work. Instead, she headed to the office. Though she was probably just helping him establish a position of authority so she could leave without guilt when she found a new job, he still appreciated her vote of confidence.
He turned back to the staff, who all pretended not to be watching. “Just let me get my tools.”
His tool belt was just where he’d left it in the tall cabinet inside the storage room. Good thing he’d thought to leave tools and a pair of coveralls there the other day. He’d learned the hard way that his motorcycle needed a tune-up soon.
After pulling on the coveralls, he returned with a bucket and his tools, scooting on his back under the sink. Around him, he could hear the whir of beaters, the chatter of voices and even the jingle of bells, announcing customers, but he stayed focused on the task at hand. Caroline believed he could handle the job, and there was no way he wouldn’t earn that belief.
Good thing for him the job wasn’t a big one: just a blob of chocolate goo turning the sink trap into a confectioner’s dam. Somehow he managed to open up the trap and chisel out the blockage without being drowned by the tidal wave once it broke loose.
He had just pushed out from beneath the sink and had turned to collect the bucket filled with nasty water when he heard approaching footsteps.
“How’s life in the bakery business, little brother?” Matthew asked.
“Some days are better than others.” His smile probably looked forced, but he didn’t care. He was frustrated that the family continued to check up on him at the bakery.
Matthew gestured toward the bucket. “I take it today is one of the worse ones?”
“It’s definitely having its moments.” Instead of waiting for Matthew to give some excuse about why he was there, Logan hefted the bucket and carried it toward the storage room where he would pour it down the utility sink.
Matthew followed him down the hall but paused when Caroline came out of the office.
“Oh, Matthew. I didn’t know you were here.” She glanced to the kitchen and then back at him. “Did you come to check up on us?”
Logan rounded the corner as fast as he could and poured the bucket into the sink. He was glad they couldn’t see him because it would have been impossible to hide his grin. Leave it to Caroline Scott to lay it all on the line.
Clearly she’d caught his brother off guard because he cleared his throat a few times before he answered.
“Uh. Well, I heard you’re doing your first weddings today, so I wanted to come by and…ah…see if there was anything the rest of us could do to help out.”
Logan set the empty bucket inside the sink and then crossed back to stand next to Caroline. “Hey, thanks for the offer, but everything seems to be under control. We’ll have these cakes off to the receptions in no time.”
Logan shouldn’t have let it bother him that Matthew didn’t look convinced, but he did. He waited for Caroline to contradict him and to insist that they accept his brother’s help. Matthew was, after all, the other firstborn overachiever in their families, the only Warren brother she would trust to do a job to her expectations.
“He’s right, Matthew.” At Logan’s surprised glance, she grinned. “We had a problem with the sink this morning, but Logan took care of it in no time. Otherwise, everything’s moving like clockwork.”
Matthew took another look down the hall to the kitchen and then turned back to them. “Well, that’s great. Glad to hear it. I have to pick up more cleaning supplies for Haley, anyway.”
“You know she’s not supposed to be working with harsh cleaners,” Caroline said. “It’s not good for the baby.”
But Matthew only chuckled at that. “Oh, I know. Haley knows it, too. That’s why she’s having me use them instead, while she drinks lemonade and plays in the sandbox with Lizzie.”
Though he laughed with the others, Logan couldn’t help sneaking a peek at Caroline. Just when he thought he’d figured her out, she surprised him again. It crossed his mind to wonder why he continued to expect the worst of her, but he decided not to analyze that. He probably wouldn’t like what he found if he did.
“My baby sister.” Caroline smiled with pride. “I taught her well.”
As soon as his brother headed out the door again, Logan turned back to her.
“You seemed awfully certain. You haven’t even been back in the kitchen. How do you know I fixed the sink?”
“Didn’t you?”
“Well, yeah, but—”
“But nothing. I’ve seen you and your brothers fix anythin
g from a running toilet to a window-sized hole in a ceiling.” She drew her eyebrows together. “Have you forgotten last Christmas when we fixed up that house for the Denton family?”
“How could I forget that? That place was a disaster when we started working.”
“Then why would you wonder how I would know that you could fix a simple sink clog? If nothing else, the Warren guys are handy. I had no reason to worry.”
“Thanks.” But as understanding dawned, he crossed his arms. “Wait. You knew it was that simple, and you had me come in to handle it? Was it just so you could give me a chance to prove myself to the staff?”
“Not just that.” As she stared down at her hands, a small smile played on her lips. “I didn’t want to get my hands dirty.”
“At least you had a good reason.”
“That and I was trying to follow the suggestion from a wise group called The Beatles that we all do better with some help from our friends.”
“Okay, this is going to be an odd day if you’re going to start citing wisdom from Sgt. Pepper this early.”
“Next time I’ll wait until after lunch.”
“Good. Now we have that settled.” He cleared his throat. “Anyway, thanks.”
“You’re welcome.”
At the loud chatter coming from the kitchen, Logan started down the hall with Caroline at his heels. No matter what they’d just told his brother, it appeared that they would be putting out fires all day at the bakery, and he could only hope it wouldn’t be literal fires.
“What do you think?” Kamie gestured like a game-show hostess to the three-tier wedding cake with fresh yellow flowers on top and leafy vines trailing down its sides. “It’s done.”
The others, who had turned from their other activities, broke out in applause.
“Great job, ladies,” Logan told her. “I’m sure the bride and groom will be impressed.”
“As long as we get it and the other one to the receptions without damaging them,” Margie added.
“We will,” he assured them. “Those weddings—at least our part in them—will be perfect.”
“Yeah, perfect,” Caroline echoed.
When Logan glanced over at her, he expected her to be grinning, chuckling even. He wasn’t disappointed. Mirth danced in her eyes, bringing a touch of light to their sapphire depths. But her smile changed then, becoming so warm and potent that Logan’s knees nearly buckled.
He’d imagined the change; that had to be it. This wouldn’t be the first time he’d misread signals from Caroline. Still, he couldn’t shake the feeling. If anyone else had looked at him that way, or said some of the same things she’d said to him this morning, he would have been certain that person was flirting, but this was Caroline Scott. His instincts were off when it came to her, his tried-and-true methods for dealing with women as ineffective as a trip with all left turns.
He hadn’t imagined it, he decided. She probably smiled that way with all of her friends. But if that was the case and he could expect more smiles like that in the coming weeks, he was especially glad to count himself among Caroline’s friends.
Chapter Six
“Two cakes today?”
Caroline smiled at the question that came out of Amy’s mouth before Caroline and Logan had made it through the door of the new room in the hospital’s rehabilitation center. The reality that Logan’s mother was sitting up in a wheelchair made her smile even more.
She didn’t even feel guilty for skipping the chance to spend another afternoon job-searching on her mother’s interminably slow Internet connection. Hadn’t somebody outlawed dial-up by now? Anyway, the chance to see Mrs. Warren out of bed was worth any job leads she missed.
“Well, somebody’s having a good day,” Caroline said.
Amy looked great, too. She wore a fluffy bathrobe over her hospital gown, and her silver hair, though not styled the way she usually wore it, was clean and combed.
This room was bigger than the last one, with four beds instead of two, all for stroke patients or those recovering from other types of brain injuries. A woman in her late fifties slept in the bed nearest the door, but the three remaining beds, including Amy’s, were empty.
“Hi, beautiful.” Logan kissed his mother’s cheek and then rubbed the side of his forefinger along her jawline. Lowering his hand, Logan helped Amy adjust the blanket in her lap so that her weaker left hand rested on top of the cloth.
Caroline swallowed, the intimate scene making her chest feel tight. Logan was such an attentive son, visiting his mother every day on his lunch hour and many evenings after work, as well. His tireless care for his mother—that had to be what had touched Caroline so deeply. So why did she suddenly wonder what it would feel like if hers were the cheek he’d kissed, if her face was the one he’d touched?
“Two?”
Caroline was grateful Amy had repeated the question, giving her the chance to avoid her own questions. They were becoming tougher and tougher to answer.
“Technically, it’s three if you count the simple two-layer that Kamie finished up late this afternoon for tonight’s ceremony at the assisted living center,” Logan told her. “Young love. Ain’t it grand?”
“I thought it was sweet,” Caroline said, frowning at him. “Two widowed seniors in their eighties have found love again. You should have seen how cute they were when I went to the center to take their order.”
Surprised by her own words, Caroline stared at the floor. When had she become a romantic, anyway? Some women swooned over things like baby’s breath, cathedral-length trains and proposals in horse-drawn carriages. She’d never been one of those women. So she was as mystified by her comment as she had been over becoming misty-eyed when that sweet senior lady had described the pillbox hat she’d ordered for her wedding.
When she finally looked up again, Logan was grinning at her. Like always, he’d just been trying to get a rise out of his mother and her. But as his gaze moved to his mother again, that smile vanished. Though he blinked a few times, his eyes remained suspiciously shiny. Instead of the warning frown that Amy usually would have given her son after one of his facetious comments, she wore a blank expression, as if she’d missed the joke.
Caroline knew what he had to be thinking. The neurologist had warned them that some stroke patients lost their sense of humor or had other personality changes after a stroke. That couldn’t happen to Mrs. Warren, not the woman who served laughter in daily doses in her home. The loss of Amy’s sweet personality would be like a death of another kind.
Caroline couldn’t help glancing at Logan again. She longed to gather her friend in her arms and tell him not to worry, but she couldn’t offer that kind of assurance. No one could. Mrs. Warren was improving every day, but the doctors warned there would be limits on how far her recovery would go.
“Three is good. June now,” Amy said, returning to the earlier subject as she often did lately. She had a hard time following quick transitions in a conversation.
Logan cleared his throat, but he managed to smile at his mother. “Yes, it is June, Mom.”
“Biggest…wedding month,” she continued.
“We’re doing fine,” he assured her. “Getting out orders on time. Even bringing in new orders for fall weddings.”
“You should see it, Mrs. Warren. Ranger Logan’s doing a great job.”
His gaze flicked to Caroline, and he gave her a look she couldn’t read before he turned back to his mother. She hoped he didn’t think she was trying to remind his mother that he was ill-suited for work at the bakery, because she hadn’t meant that at all.
“We would be doing even better if you were back again,” Logan told her.
“Might not go back.”
“Of course you will.” Pulling a chair up next to Amy’s wheelchair, Logan laid his fingers over her curled left hand. “You just have a few things to do here first.”
“So what did you do in physical therapy today?” Caroline asked, drawing another chair over and taking a s
eat. She glanced at Amy’s bed, which was freshly made up with hospital corners. “Did they have you up walking?”
“Hard,” Amy said.
“Oh, I know it must be. But you did walk, right?”
“In the hall.”
“Mom, that’s great,” Logan said, leaning over to press his cheek to hers. “I can’t believe you didn’t tell us that good news right away. You’re making amazing progress.”
Amy only shrugged.
Logan glanced away, his Adam’s apple shifting as he swallowed a few times before looking back.
A hospital employee brought a dining tray in then, giving them the chance to let the subject drop. Caroline didn’t know what to say, anyway. She doubted Logan would admit it, but his mother’s progress had been slower than any of them had hoped.
Mrs. Warren’s attitude worried her, as well. Caroline had always admired her for being so relentlessly positive, even after her husband left. Now she didn’t have a positive thing to say. She no longer seemed to have hope.
Logan continued to praise his mother’s small accomplishments as she fed herself with her good hand, and when she didn’t notice the drip of chicken broth that landed on her chin, he dabbed it with a napkin.
“There you go. Good as new.”
But after he said it, his gaze darted to Caroline, his expression as stark and hopeless as his mother’s words had been. They couldn’t call anything about Amy’s appearance or her new pessimistic attitude as good as new.
“Well, look who’s already entertaining a crowd,” Dylan called from the doorway, where he stood with Jenna. Still dressed in her navy flight attendant uniform, Jenna waved as she entered the room.
“Yeah, it’s quite a party in here.”
Logan turned to the window and pinched the bridge of his nose as he spoke, but when he turned back again, he had control over his emotions. Caroline and Jenna exchanged a knowing look, but in true guy form, Dylan pretended not to notice his brother’s emotional moment.
